The BCCI may have ruled out an immediate expansion of the Women\u2019s Premier League (WPL), but IPL side Punjab Kings co-owner Mohit Burman says the franchise would love to own a team in the four-season-old tournament at some point.<\/p>\n
The WPL currently has three teams owned by IPL franchises\u2014Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Delhi Capitals.<\/p>\n
While the BCCI has no immediate plans to add to the existing five-team WPL, Burman is bullish about the growth of the game globally and would be happy to invest in the league when the opportunity arises.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe WPL has already established itself as an important platform for the women\u2019s game in a very short period of time. The growth of women\u2019s cricket has been fantastic to witness,\u201d Burman, who owns 48 per cent stake in Punjab Kings, told PTI.<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cAs for investment decisions, every group evaluates opportunities differently depending on timing, strategic priorities and long-term business considerations. Not investing initially should not be interpreted as a lack of belief in women\u2019s cricket. Personally, I think the future of the women\u2019s game is extremely bright. We would love to own a women\u2019s IPL team,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Burman feels the recent success of WPL and Indian women\u2019s team has generated a lot of interest at the grassroots level.<\/p>\n
The Harmanpreet Kaur-led India won the women\u2019s ODI World Cup for the first time last year and is being considered a strong contender for the T20 world crown, which will be contested next month in England.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe quality of cricket, audience interest and commercial response have all exceeded expectations in many ways. What is especially encouraging is the impact it is having at the grassroots level,\u201d Burman said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYoung girls today can see women cricketers as major sporting icons and viable professional athletes, and that changes the future of the sport entirely,\u201d he added, referring to the sharp increase in the brand value of women cricketers after last year\u2019s World Cup triumph.<\/p>\n
Earlier this year, Chennai Super Kings CEO Kasi Viswanathan also expressed the storied franchise\u2019s interest in investing in women\u2019s cricket.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot immediately, but certainly in the coming years, CSK will expand its footprint. Our first target will be women\u2019s cricket. We may also go into other sports over time,\u201d Viswanathan had said at a conclave.<\/p>\n
IPL chairman Arun Dhumal had told PTI<\/i> last year that the board had no immediate plans to add teams to WPL.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo further strengthen this tournament for the time being, we want to consolidate before we take a call on further addition of any team. There are no immediate plans (to add teams),\u201d Dhumal had said.<\/p>\n
WPL began in 2023 with five teams. Mumbai Indians and RCB have won a couple of titles each in the editions held so far.<\/p>\n
Published on May 18, 2026<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The BCCI may have ruled out an immediate expansion of the Women\u2019s Premier League (WPL), but IPL side Punjab Kings co-owner Mohit Burman says the franchise would love to own a team in the four-season-old tournament at some point. The WPL currently has three teams owned by IPL franchises\u2014Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Delhi…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":168837,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-168836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1779085093_image2017.jpg","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pgnRh4-HVa","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=168836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/168837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=168836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=168836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newslink360.space\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=168836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}